I am trying to catch up from the weekend. No Cardinal minor leaguer won player of the week honors. Seems there is dissention in the Cardinal clubhouse, this time it is Juan andTony. It seems it is always Tony and somebody. Hopefully, the MRI Juan is having is clear and they can ship him somewhere.

The Cardinals have a big week coming up. The Redbirds have 7 on the road against the Brewers then the Cubs. A 6-1 trip would be great but the Cardinals need to do no worse than a 4-3 split.

Derrick Goold is reporting that the Cardinals are still attempting to sign Kyle Russell. The Redbirds have until midnight on Wednesday to get a deal done. The fourth round pick out of Texas is holding out for first round $$ and the Cardinals knew this when they drafted him. A cool million will probably get the deal done. Also, in the same article, Goold reports that the Cardinals signed prep righty Brett Zawacki. I have more on Zawacki here. Check out the pic of Zawacki over at the News Tribune. He was considered one of the top righties in the country and fell due to signability concerns. The deal was done over the weekend according to Goold and the deal could be finalized as early as today. I am sure the Cardinals are delaying the announcement due to the deal being above the recommended slot dollars recommended by the Commissioner’s office.

The Cardinals’ system had only one player on this weeks Baseball America Hotsheet, Springfield shortstop Jose Martinez at number 20. From BA: Martinez was one of our breakout candidates back in a March edition of Prospect Pulse, and while it’s taken the 21-year-old Venezuelan some time to get rolling after being promoted from high Class A Palm Beach in June, he’s proven to be a valuable commodity in the organization. After hitting .158 over his first eight games, Martinez is batting .391/.404/.696 in August–a month after he drove in 24 runs in July.

In the Not So Hot feature was Blake Dewitt. From BA: Dewitt got off to a fast start when he was promoted to the Southern League, but is hitting just .138 this month with no RBIs. It is actually .215 with an RBI. He hit really well in the 2 hole, struggled when dropped to the five hole, and is beginning to hit again as he was shifted back to the 2 hole.

From Baseball Prospectus Future Shock: Daryl Jones is the best athlete in the Cardinals system…… After two up-and-down years in short-season leagues, the Cardinals put him in the Midwest League, and he struggled mightily…. Over the last two week, something is suddenly clicking with Jones, and perhaps Cardinals fans should be excited. On Sunday, Jones hit a game-winning home run as part of his first four-hit game of the year, and in his last 10 games he’s gone 17-for-39. As to whether or not this is real, that’s still a mystery, but this has been his hottest streak of the season by a mile, the potential for a breakout has always been there, and in the end we just don’t know yet.

The Cardinals claimed utility man Brian Barden from the Arizona system. BA had him rated as the 20th prospect in the Diamondback system. A natural 3B, Barden can play any of the infield positions and should add more depth to an infield challenged system.

Adam Daniels was shaky again with 4 runs allowed in 5 innings. Daniels allowed 7 hits and walked 5. Matt Scherer gave up 2 runs on 3 hits in 2 innings. Amaury Marti was the only player with 2 hits. Cody Haerther doubled and drove in the only run.

Those of you sweating out the Kyle Russell signing, it is just not happening in St. Louis. From BA: We still have 13 unsigned first-rounders (there hasn’t been a first-rounder who didn’t come to terms since the Orioles’ Wade Townsend in 2004) and 40 unsigned picks through the first five rounds (compared to just four from 2006). Most of those players will sign, and many of them already have agreed to terms that won’t be announced until just before the deadline.

John Sickels on Ankiel: *Rick Ankiel is like something out of a novel. If you pitched this story to a Hollywood studio or major publishing house, it would be rejected as unrealistic and/or a derivative copy of someone else’s work.